


Birth By Sleep

by silveradept



Series: The Heart of the Miraculous [2]
Category: Kingdom Hearts, Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Chat Noir Identity Reveal, Chat Noir Needs Better Fanart, Chat Noir Suicidally Ideates, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, F/M, Ladybug is not having it, Self-Sacrificing Bad Ideas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-12 17:57:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 12,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19950466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silveradept/pseuds/silveradept
Summary: Ladybug dives into Chat Noir's heart to rescue him from the last akuma. Outside, Rena, Carapace, and a potential new hero fight Lila, who has embraced the role of villain in Hawk Moth's absence.





	1. Storm Driver

**Author's Note:**

> With great thanks to [AlexSeanchai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieMurasaki/pseuds/AlexSeanchai), who betaed and SPAG'd this. Go read [their Miraculous Ladybug fic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieMurasaki/pseuds/AlexSeanchai/works?fandom_id=582724), because it's excellent.

It had to be a dream.

At least this time it wasn't _her_ dream.

Ladybug landed safely at what looked to be her school after falling for what seemed like an eternity. Did Chat Noir go to her school? That narrowed down the possibilities of who Chat Noir could be pretty significantly.

She took a step forward and Plagg, Chat’s kwami, flew in front of her face.

"Are you the real thing?" he asked in an adorably squeaky voice.

"Yes?" she replied, not entirely sure what he was asking.

"You're not one of his dream-Ladybugs?"

"No," she said, curious.

"You look more solid than they do," Plagg said, zipping around her to study her more fully. "Prove it. What's his favorite flavor of cheese?"

"He hates it," she said automatically. "I think he's lactose-intolerant."

"Yep, you're the real deal," Plagg said. "Good to see you again. Got any Camembert?."

"No," Ladybug said. “Do you always have to ask for cheese when you meet someone?”

"I don't make the rules," Plagg said defensively. "Listen, I'm glad you're here, I really am, but there are some things I've got to do before I can let you pass."

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"So, you know how kwami can't say who their master is?" At her nod, Plagg continued. "Well, it turns out that's one part of a much bigger prohibition about letting other people find out about the identity of your Master. Or Mistress," Plagg added belatedly.

"Tikki didn't protect me at all from being discovered by Chat Noir," Ladybug said acidly. "If she had, I _certainly_ would have appreciated it."

"You were whammied at the time." Plagg shrugged. "It would have been worse to let someone control your superpowered self for the sake of preserving your identity."

Ladybug huffed. Plagg may have been right, but it was still embarrassing. And it would have made Chat Noir a huge liability if he hadn't—

"Hey," Plagg said, distracting her from her thoughts. "Be careful with that. There's already enough free-floating negativity around here looking for a home. I'd rather not go through 'Reasons Chat Noir Thinks He's Useless And Should Die' volumes 1–99."

"Sorry." Unintentionally creating negative things in Chat's dreams was a bad plan.

"Yeah. You'll see enough nightmares in here if you dive much deeper than this," Plagg said, resigned. Had he read her mind?

Before anyone could resolve that question fully, a black blur came sailing out the school doors, rolling to an uncomfortable-looking stop a significant distance away.

"In the name of the Black Cat Miraculous," Chat Noir's voice rang out as he bounded out the door and struck a pose, "I will defeat you, evildoer!"

Ladybug's jaw would have needed to detach itself to be any more open. It was definitely Chat Noir, but he'd traded his black leather catsuit for a sailor fuku uniform, dark black on midnight black with light black highlights, with black leggings underneath and his signature cat ears on top of his bottle-blonde, nearly white, hair. His staff had changed into a war hammer identical to the one she'd seen Mme. Bustier use to smash Heartless not that long ago. Chat swung the hammer with ease, battering through any attacks or defenses the human-looking darkness could muster.

"Have I been calling Chat Noir by the wrong pronouns this entire time?" Ladybug asked Plagg.

"Nah," Plagg replied. "He's always dreamt of getting some kind of superpower and using it to save the world. He wouldn't bat an eye at any costume if it meant he could be a hero. Magical girl anime just happens to be the easiest way of visualizing it."

Ladybug sidestepped quickly to avoid a collision as the dark character took another launching from Sailor Chat.

"Hello, my Lady," Sailor Chat said, as if noticing her presence for the first time. "Have you come to help me fight this nightmare? I keep defeating him, but he never stays beaten for long. I don't think dreams are supposed to be like this."

"I can try," she replied.

Sailor Chat dashed off, leading the next flurry of attacks with an axe kick that made Ladybug very glad Chat's magical-girl persona included sensible leg wear.

As she observed the battle, Ladybug began to feel suspicious about the sequence of attacks and reactions. The nightmare's flinches at being hit by the war hammer were subtly off. She had been watching Nora Césaire pummel her opponents with fists and feet enough to realize a body being beaten didn't move that way. It seemed like the nightmare was waiting just a small beat to see what was supposed to happen before reacting to the blow.

She swung up to a higher vantage to focus on seeing where the next swing would connect. From the new perspective, it became clear to her the hammer passed exceptionally close to the nightmare's body, but Ladybug never saw it actually touch.

Had this been stunt performance, she would have hired Sailor Chat and the nightmare's actor on the spot: Sailor Chat was missing by just enough, and the nightmare's reactions were fast enough, that it would look normal to anyone who didn't know what to look for.

Sailor Chat thrust with the hammer and the nightmare danced back. Ladybug swung over to her partner.

"Next time you get the opportunity, hit it up into the air," she said softly. "I'll bring it back to you until you can defeat it."

Sailor Chat grinned, a fire in his eyes.

"Come and get me!" he shouted at the nightmare.

The nightmare rushed in. Sailor Chat swung, but the nightmare jumped on his hammer and looked to flip off of it gracefully. Ladybug wrapped her yo-yo around the nightmare's ankles and pulled as soon as he left the hammer's surface, turning a cinematic stunt into an awkward dive right back toward Sailor Chat, who was bringing the hammer around for another swing.

The sound of metal making contact with made it clear to Ladybug the other thing that had been missing from the conflict before. She let the nightmare launch up from Chat's hit before hauling in the string to bring it back down into Sailor Chat's next hammer uppercut. For several repetitions the duo played paddle ball with the nightmare, until Sailor Chat turned the hammer around and smashed the nightmare into the ground, where it slowly faded away.

"Thanks, my Lady," he said, walking back toward the school, leaning on his hammer and breathing heavily. "I guess I wasn't really ready to acknowledge that."

"Acknowledge what?" she asked, confused.

"What I was having my nightmare about," he said.

"Which was?"

Chat shook his head. "If I told you, I might burden you with it," he said. "I'm not weighing down your heart with my problems."

Before she could protest again, Chat opened a school door and disappeared inside.

"Did that fix him?" Ladybug asked Plagg.

"Nuh-uh," Plagg replied. "This is level one. There are a lot more nightmares where that one came from."

"Then we'll get them all, if that's what it takes to get him back," she said.

"It's not pretty in there," Plagg warned.

Ladybug ignored him and started looking for a keyhole to find the next place to dive to.

"Hey!" Plagg shouted, flying in front of Ladybug's face. "You dive in too far, you might not come out!"

"Fine with me!" she snapped at Plagg. "It's my fault he's like this to start with."

Plagg floated in silence for a bit.

"You're a lot like him," he ventured.

"In what way?" she asked heatedly.

"You both want to blame yourselves for things that aren't your fault," Plagg said.

Ladybug whirled to deliver a rebuke, but it died on her lips as she spotted a floating, glowing keyhole. She strode over to the keyhole, manifesting her Keyblade to unlock the next location.

She took a deep breath and turned the key. Light filled her eyes and she was falling again.


	2. Villains Of A Sort

"What happened here?" Fu asked, taking in the scene before him.

"Fu," said the woman in the Peacock armor, confirming what he had suspected about who held that Miraculous now, "we have a problem."

"Indeed," he said, nodding. "I see three Miraculous wielders who look ready to fight each other, and two more Miraculous wielders unconscious. I think we can safely call this a problem. What happened?"

"Hawk Moth," all three of them said together, and then tried to explain the situation all at once.

"…so she dove into his heart, and we brought them here," Émilie finished.

Master Fu took in a deep, cleansing breath. Fixing this situation was going to require thought and careful action, he thought.

"Would you all like some tea?" he asked.

The question hung in the air for a moment before everyone said yes.

Putting the kettle on, he saw that Émilie had followed him into the kitchen.

"I am happy to see you alive and whole again," he said.

"I missed you, Fu," she replied. "And I'm glad that you're here, because I have to go back to the mansion. Adrien is going to be confused about why Gabriel and Nathalie are gone, and I'd like it to be his mother who finds him rather than someone else."

"If everything that I have heard is true, they were not a good influence on his life," Fu replied. "Adrien may be exercising the greatest amount of freedom he has had in life for a long time."

"I don't want to lose him again," Émilie said.

"Go, then," Fu said tenderly. "If your son is in the mansion, you will certainly find him."

"Thank you, Master Fu," she said.

The tea kettle boiled as she left. Master Fu put out three cups.

"Um, dude," Carapace said when Master Fu came back, "there's a problem."

"An old villain has returned to Paris," Mme. Chamack was saying though a speaker on Rena's flute. "Volpina has proclaimed herself the queen of Paris and demanded the surrender of Ladybug and Chat Noir as proof of her superiority."

"Chl—Queen Bee's not going to like that," Rena said, stifling a chuckle. "But if Hawk Moth is dead, then who's giving Volpina her powers again?"

"There is more than enough darkness in human hearts to create a Heartless, even without Hawk Moth," Master Fu said. "With Ladybug and Chat Noir unavailable, you will have to fight off Volpina yourselves."

"What happened to the Peacock lady, dude?" Carapace said.

"She was going to the Agreste mansion," Master Fu replied. "If you hurry, you will catch her before she gets there and enlist her aid in the battle."

The two Miraculous holders nodded and departed.

Master Fu sat down with a heavy sigh.

"I said that it would be dangerous to give the Replica a Keyblade," Master Ansem said, appearing from a dark portal in front of him. "Now do you trust my wisdom?"

Master Fu looked up and gave Ansem the Wise a glare.

"If you want to prove your wisdom, Master Ansem, you can _help_."

* * *

Rena had sent Carapace on to collect the Peacock and bring her to the fight. She expected it would take a while, which suited her perfectly fine. The first appearance of Volpina had been before Rena had Trixx, but the second time, she'd been involved in Heroes' Day, and Rena hadn't had the opportunity to pay that kitsune back for the bad name she gave foxes.

Vaulting up to a rooftop, she saw Volpina standing menacingly, looking down on Paris from the top of the Louvre's glass pyramid. To anyone other than Rena Rouge, it would have been a convincing illusion, but she could see the way it failed to reflect light and shadow and the slight translucency it had when the sun shone on it.

"Losing your touch, Volpina," she said to herself, as she looked for likely hiding spots for the villain. "You can't fool me with that sub-par illusion."

"I don't need to," Volpina's voice hissed near her. Rena jumped away, expecting an attack to follow. When none came, she resumed scanning for something out of place.

"You know it won't be that easy," Rena said. "Ladybug and Chat Noir aren't going to surrender to you."

"And yet, they sent you in their place," Volpina said smugly.

"Because you don't warrant their attention," Rena shot back mockingly. "You're not even worth their time in person."

There! The pattern on the brick distorted just slightly. Rena leapt for the space to strike it with her flute. Volpina shimmered into view as she dodged the hit, swinging her own weapon as an attempt to catch Rena off-guard.

Rena parried the strike easily and punched Volpina in the nose with her other hand. Volpina reeled before swinging back with her own fist. Rena ducked and delivered another hit to Volpina's body. Growing up with a kickboxer for a sister had its advantages when you could get close enough to use it, she thought, driving an elbow into Volpina's nose and following it with a solid flute strike.

Volpina jumped back out of range, snarling. Rena smiled as she saw the blood dripping from Volpina's nose.

"You're a mess, girl," Rena taunted. "But if you want more, there's plenty to be had."

Volpina rushed in again, bringing her weapon up over her head to strike. Rena stopped Volpina's advance by stabbing her in the solar plexus with her own weapon, before kneeing her in the face and delivering Nora's signature uppercut immediately afterward while Volpina was still gasping for air.

"Don't give up on me yet," Rena shouted at her laid-out opponent. "There's still a lot more you have to answer for."

Volpina staggered to her feet and came after Rena again. Rena stepped aside and tripped her as she went by, letting Volpina fall headfirst into one of the brick walls.

"Go home, Volpina," Rena said, realizing the fight was done. "Let the big girls handle things."

"What a splendid idea," said a green-skinned woman dressed in black, with giant horns and a sorcerer's staff, as she appeared next to Volpina from a column of purple.

"Yeah," said a large armored creature following her. "I'll handle this one, Maleficent."

Maleficent's eyes suggested the creature had committed some sort of faux pas in that sentence, but she only clasped Volpina's shoulder.

"I will leave it up to you," she said. "Come, child. You require more training." Maleficent and Volpina disappeared into the people column.

"Today's your lucky day," he said. "You're going to get the honor of being walloped by Pete."

"Is that so?" Rena said, smiling. "I've beaten bigger things than you."

"Ooh, scary," Pete mocked, as several Heartless popped into existence around him. "Still feeling confident, girlie?"

Rena gave Pete a fanged grin. "Bring it."


	3. Sinister Shadows

She nearly tripped over herself as she coasted to a stop. Looking around the new space she'd landed in, there were a lot of Ladybugs. Ladies-Bug? Each of them seemed to be performing the same action, phrase, or pose. A small snippet of time, repeated endlessly. The noise would have been deafening, save that the Ladybugs were only audible when she was near enough to them to hear them, and only the one she was focused on could move or speak. One of the Ladies-Bug was striking a very heroic pose, and Ladybug wanted to see why it had worked so well for everyone.

"Memory Gallery," Plagg squeaked behind her.

Ladybug startled and almost hit Plagg with her yo-yo.

"Don't scare me like that! I could have hurt you," she almost screamed.

"Still a kwami," Plagg retorted. "Even you would have a hard time hurting me."

She ignored the kwami and went back to studying the posing figure.

"Why would this be memorable?" she said.

"I have a pretty good idea," Plagg said, "but I don't think you want to know."

"Why not?"

"Do you _reeeeeally_ want to go diving into the fantasy life of a teenage boy?" Plag said, making a face.

Any other day, she would have said no. Any day before the day when Chat Noir learned who she was underneath the mask. She wanted to know what he felt about her, in both of her lives.

"There are probably nightmares making his fantasies turn sour," she said. "If they can hurt him, then I need to get rid of them."

She strode determinedly toward Chat's fantasy zone.

"Not all his nightmares come from Hawk Moth," Plagg said. "You remember Sandboy."

She stopped.

The nightmare Ladybug had been her equal, just powered by hate instead of a fond annoyance. She'd beaten her with the help of her partner. Who she was trying to rescue from himself. Could she take on herself and win?

"No matter who I have to fight," she said, resuming her pace, "I will rescue Chat Noir and bring him back."

She'd deal with the Nightmare Bug if she encountered her. Best not to borrow trouble or worry.

She knew she was firmly in the fantasy zone when she saw herself again, but this Ladybug was impossibly buxom, her costume had changed to provide a boob window so that any observer could see all of the cleavage present, and she was bent over so that it would be impossible to miss seeing all of this as she blew a kiss at, presumably, Chat Noir.

"I warned you," Plagg said, reading the scowl on her face.

"The proportions are all wrong!" she snapped. "If I were that…top-heavy, it would be a struggle to stand upright any day of the week! My back hurts just _looking_ at her. And boob windows went out of fashion in comics decades ago."

Plagg's jaw hung open for a moment.

"So, you're not mad that he's envisioning you as a busty comic heroine?"

"Chat Noir needs to look at better fanart than this!" she responded.

The next one was marginally better, in the sense that she had been drawn with better anatomy, but as much as she had seen Chat lean into the magical girl aesthetic earlier, she wasn't really a fan of the excess ribbons and bows put on the costume. The fishing rod design she'd been given as a way of controlling her yo-yo looked interesting, though.

If she remembered, she'd have to ask Chat about where he looked for Ladybug fanart. He clearly had different sources than what she could find.

"Tag!" a black blur shouted as it rushed past. Almost immediately afterward, Ladybug heard her own voice yell "Get back here, Chat Noir!" and a (thankfully) accurate Ladybug followed in hot pursuit.

She watched as the two bounced and swung their way around what were probably Parisian rooftops, Chat Noir always staying maddeningly out of reach to the pursuing Ladybug.

"Missed me, missed me, now you'll have to kiss me!" he taunted her after a really close attempt.

Ladybug laughed as the dream-Ladybug flicked her wrist and wrapped up Chat Noir with her yo-yo string before hauling him up to her eye level.

"Ah…hello, my Lady," Chat said, suddenly nervous at the smug look on the dream-Ladybug's face.

"What was that about a kiss, now?" the dream-Ladybug said, before cutting off his reply with a passionate kiss.

Ladybug turned scarlet as her dream-self continued to make out with the bound Chat Noir. Some of the sounds in the fantasy were making it clear to her how much both parties were enjoying themselves. This was far more intense of a scenario than she'd expected to see.

Turning away from the romance in front of her, Ladybug followed another pathway onto a battlefield. She watched herself as Marinette punching Lila Rossi in the face, screaming at her to stop lying. Lila flinched and put her hands up to protect herself, but Marinette batted her arms aside and continued to beat Lila, providing very specific details about lies, falsehoods, and schemes meant to turn the class against her, to get her friends to hate her, and to ruin her chances with the boy she loved. Lila looked terrified, as if it had finally dawned on her that she had pushed Marinette past the brink and that she wasn't going to get out alive. Every time she opened her mouth, whether to protest or scream, or possibly even beg for her life, Marinette punched her until she shut it again, without breaking her recitation of Lila's copious number of sins.

Ladybug could see the people butterfly on approach, drawn to the very clear outpouring of emotion on display. As it flew in, the scene glitched, and instead of Marinette, _a Ladybug_ was now in the path of the akuma. The butterfly's aim was true, and Ladybug watched in horror as her dream self transformed into a fully-armored nightmare, complete with the zweihander sword she had seen called forth many times by other imitation Ladybugs. It always reminded her of the soul-stealing sword she had seen in one of the other fighting games she had seen Max and Adrien play.

"Oh, no," she said quietly.

The armored Ladybug nightmare's head swiveled away from Lila to fix her with a stare. Had it noticed her, or was this part of the nightmare in Chat's mind?

The nightmare turned around fully to face her. She held very still, hoping it wouldn't think of her as out of the ordinary. The nightmare hefted the sword and stared at her for a moment or two more. She heard her own voice utter a battle cry, and the nightmare rushed her far more quickly than any superhero should be able to.

"Oh, _shit_ ," Ladybug said, ducking to avoid Nightmare Bug's first strike and rolling away from the second. She needed to find some place to hide or any sort of cover that she could use to buy time and come up with a plan.

Even if Nightmare Bug were to let up on her attacks long enough for Ladybug to properly take in the scene, she noticed a distinct lack of anything that could be used to slow the onslaught.

She finally managed to get enough space between them to pull out her yo-yo and try to fight back, but Nightmare Bug seemed to know where she was going to throw and knocked it away before it could do anything, often following up with a sword slash that Ladybug barely dodged.

After several rounds of this Bug-and-Bug exchange, Ladybug smiled as she wrapped the yo-yo around the sword. Nightmare Bug jerked the sword back toward herself and Ladybug soared helplessly toward what was shaping up to be her end.

She closed her eyes as Nightmare Bug began to swing.

She heard a loud metallic sound.

And then tumbled to a stop, miraculously still alive. Opening her eyes, she saw Nightmare Bug locked in a struggle with…someone in a long black coat. The hood was up, so she couldn't see who it was, but they had a sword in the shape of a key. Simple silver, simple design, gold around the silver hilt. It looked a bit cartoonish, really.

Why they called it a Keyblade made way more sense when she saw it like that, though.

The black coat figure flung the nightmare's blade off their own and slashed the helmet of the nightmare. The two traded blows, but it was becoming increasingly clear the black coat wielder was the better of the two, as they chained strikes into combinations, always keeping their blade in the right position to smoothly block the next hit and go back to their attack.

Ladybug felt her blood sing at them.

Their technique, she corrected herself, looking around for something to use to gain an advantage. It would be a bad idea to get distracted. And who would be interested in someone who told them 'I get warm and tingly when you swing your sword' anyway?

A loud cracking sound refocused her attention. The Nightmare Bug's armor shattered into shards. From the pieces on the ground, a small purple butterfly floated up. _That_ she knew how to deal with.

Even so, she nearly tripped over the string when she threw the yo-yo to capture the akuma. Being Ladybug was supposed to help her be less clumsy, not give her more opportunities for it.

"Bye-bye, little but—urk!" she said, the sudden presence of a Keyblade on her throat stopping her from finishing. She hasn't even seen the black-coated figure cross the considerable distance, much less _move_ in the first place.

She suppressed the urge to say that their relationship was moving too fast for her taste. Chat Noir's tendency for inappropriate puns must be rubbing off on her. At least she wasn't spending time thinking about what puns to use as soon as an akuma appeared.

The pressure on her throat eased as the black coat figure stepped back, Keyblade still pointed threateningly at her heart.

"It's okay," said a woman Ladybug was sure had not been there a moment ago. Ladybug felt a pang of concern for her, as the white dress she was wearing looked very old, and barely made it to the tops of her knees. "I think we're on the same side."

The black coat figure pointedly shrugged.

"I'm pretty sure she's the Keyblade wielder Master Fu mentioned," the woman in white continued.

Belatedly, Ladybug remembered what Master Fu had said about the yo-yo's nature as a Keyblade. If she concentrated, she could change its shape into something else.

The yo-yo winked out of existence, replaced immediately by the familiar weight of the Keyblade-on-string she had summoned in other battles with her Lucky Charm.

The black coat figure's Keyblade vanished.

Sighing with relief, Ladybug let her own Keyblade return to being the yo-yo at her side.

"How do you know Master Fu?" she asked the woman in white.

"He sent us here, after Ansem the Wise asked us to help you out," she replied, smiling.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Naminé," the woman in white said, pointing to herself, "and this is Xion, my bodyguard," she added, giggling as she pointed at the black coat figure.

Xion waved, hesitantly.

"Ladybug. What are you doing here?" Ladybug asked.

"Ansem sent us here to try and help," Naminé said. "Someone is trying to replace the heart of this Replica with their own."

"Replica?" Ladybug asked, confused.

"Oh, dear," Naminé said sharply. "They made it sound like everyone already knew."

"They knew, certainly," Xion said, sounding exactly like Kagami to Ladybug's ears. Xion sighed. "I'm a Replica as well," she said, "and technically, so is Naminé."

Ladybug's confusion must have registered to Xion, because she continued.

"Replicas are containers for hearts. Once you stick one in there, the body looks like whatever the heart inside thinks they look like. With time, the heart and body bind to each other pretty well, but it's not impossible to separate them again. Or, in this case, to displace, or replace, someone else's heart with theirs."

"Hawk Moth," Ladybug said, curling her hands into fists. Chat had destroyed him, as he deserved, but he still stuck around, and now he was trying to take over Chat's body. Well, that wasn't happening. Not while she was here!

"Easy, easy," Plagg said, popping out from wherever he had been hiding for the last fight. "Keep that rage in your head, but keep it under control. Otherwise, it'll be a beacon. Hawk Moth will be drawn to your flame. You want to keep fighting yourself the whole way down?"

It was an appealing thought, to burn off all this anger in the most violent way possible, but she needed to be fresh, not exhausted, when she got rid of Hawk Moth permanently. "No."

Ladybug felt Xion smile, although there was no way she could have seen it through her hood.

"You still haven't answered my question," Ladybug pointed out. "Why are you two here in Chat Noir's heart?"

"I have a lot of practice at repairing damage to hearts and memories," Naminé said, giving a wry smile. "What…Hawk Moth, did you say his name was? What he destroys, I can rebuild. And I can remove his influence. But it takes time, and it makes…noise, I guess."

"That's what I'm here for," Xion said. "To keep the nightmares away while Naminé works. And save Keyblade wielders, too.."

Ladybug frowned. Xion shrugged.

"What do you think, Plagg?" Ladybug said. "Do we trust them?"

"Do you have a choice?" Plagg replied.

"We did save you from that nightmare," Xion pointed out.

"All right," Ladybug said. "But if you're lying to me, I'll come back here and make you regret it.” Even if she wasn’t exactly sure how she could do that to a dream-changing girl and her scarily competent bodyguard.

"We'll keep that in mind," Naminé said seriously.

The memory that had produced the nightmare restarted itself. This time, Marinette was the only person thrashing Lila, and while there wasn't a purple butterfly visible, it became clear that at a certain point, only Marinette had been infected with an akuma.

"Not every fantasy is a happy one," Plagg said quietly. Ladybug nodded grimly and pressed on.

When she turned the next corner, she screamed.


	4. Shrouding Dark Cloud

"My son is in there!" Carapace heard as he landed near the Agreste mansion.

"Madame," the police officer said, shaking his head. "No civilians are allowed inside. Not until the emergency personnel have cleared the building and the police have finished their investigation. If your son is in there, madame, they'll find him."

Carapace felt bad for Officer Raincomprix. Dude was devoted to public safety, but that often meant having to make the public unhappy as part of trying to keep them safe.

"I just want to know if he's safe," the woman said. "Can you see if anyone has seen him?"

"What is your son's name, Madame?" Officer Raincomprix opened his notebook.

"Adrien Agreste."

Carapace stopped. Adrien had told Nino that his mom had been missing for years. Could this woman be her? She certainly looked like the picture on Adrien's phone.

"And your name, madame?"

"Émilie Agreste."

Carapace could see the gears turning in the policeman's head.

"Do you have a telephone number we can contact you at, Mme. Agreste?"

"I do," she said, smiling. She wrote numbers that Carapace couldn't see clearly on the pad and handed it back to Officer Raincomprix.

"Thank you, Mme. Agreste. If your son turns up here, we'll let you know what hospital he's been taken to and you can see him there."

"I can help with the search efforts," she said.

"No civilians, madame," Officer Raincomprix replied firmly. Then his voice softened. "If your son is in there, we will find him. These are the best search and rescue personnel in France."

Carapace could see 'Madame Agreste' thinking, too. Ultimately, she walked away from the scene. He thought about following her, but Raincomprix was calling in the conversation he had just finished to the station for follow-up as part of the investigation that would happen into the damage at the Agreste mansion. Carapace listened with worry as Raincomprix described finding no bodies so far in the wreckage.

Not long after Raincomprix finished, Carapace spotted a familiar peacock blue character sailing over the officer's head undetected. Now that she had shown him how to do it, it was pretty easy for Carapace to also evade Raincomprix's sharp eyes and get inside the house.

He thought he had been quiet getting in, but turning into the kitchen, Carapace felt the edge of one of the Peacock's razor fans against his throat.

"Oh," said the wielder of the fan, "it's you. What are you doing here?"

"Looking for you," he said, gently trying to ease away from the fan. "There's a fight we want your help with. Volpina we've fought—"

"—No."

"Selfish much? I didn't even get to finish."

"It doesn't matter. Someone very important to me could be buried under this rubble."

"So, if I help you, you'll help me?" Carapace offered.

The Peacock wielder thought about it, then withdrew her fan.

"Start hauling."

* * *

"Dammit, where is he?" Rena muttered under her breath.

Pete had proven a surprisingly hard nut to crack, pulling out swarms of Heartless at a snap of his fingers and generally keeping himself behind a barrier that Rena couldn't dent, much less break, before more Heartless arrived and needed taking care of.

She'd sent Carapace away a long time ago. What could be taking so long to find a Miraculous wielder and convince her to fight?

She just barely dodged a big balloon-bellied Heartless trying to slide into her. Swatting it with her weapon, she directed it into other Heartless, scattering them.

Pete laughed. "Getting tired, girlie?" he taunted.

Rena batted a soldier Heartless into its fellows and rushed Pete. Before she could get at him, she saw the golden aura of his barrier spring up, protecting him from whatever possible pain she had in mind for him. Snarling, Rena redirected her attack to poof the pile of shadows near him.

There had to be a better way of dealing with this until everyone else got here. She needed them to focus elsewhere. A distraction would be perfect right about now.

After smashing another group of Heartless, the lightbulb turned on in her head. She quickly ducked into an alleyway and summoned the Mirage, crafting an illusion of herself to appear a few rooftops over.

"Still fresh," Mirage-Rena taunted back, hopping another rooftop over. "Bet you can't catch me."

Pete smiled. "My friends will take care of that," he said, snapping his fingers and summoning Heartless to surround her Mirage.

Rena made the Mirage disappear and reappear another rooftop over, making it look like she had teleported. Pete summoned another set of Heartless to catch her. At some point, Pete had to run out of minions to summon, she thought, as they repeated the process of disappearing, reappearing, and having a batch of Heartless appear to surround her.

It didn't look like Pete was going to run out of Heartless any time soon. She needed some more help.

It arrived, much to Rena's surprise, in the form of Queen Bee. It was clear to Rena that Queen Bee had been practicing, as her top spun its way through groups of Heartless, poofing nearly everything it touched. It didn't have the ease and grace attached from having practiced enough to make it second-nature, but Rena wasn't going to complain about form when the results were exceedingly effective.

"You're not polluting my city with these ridiculous creatures," Queen Bee proclaimed, pointing her top at Pete.

Pete smirked. "We'll see about that, girl," he said, making sure to add heavy emphasis on 'girl'.

Queen Bee snapped her top at Pete, who raised his barrier as he had done with Rena. The top crashed into the barrier and stuck, still spinning and trying to work its way through. Pete summoned Heartless as an extra protective layer, and the top went spinning off in another direction after poofing a few.

For the first time since he had arrived, Pete looked unnerved.

Rena had an idea and sent her Mirage away from Queen Bee. They should see whether or not Pete could keep an eye on two opponents at once.

Pete responded by backing himself toward a wall and summoning yet more Heartless to protect the space in front of him. Just her luck, Rena thought, that this particular blustering flunky would also be good at strategy.

Queen Bee looked unimpressed with this turn of events. "Ridiculous," she said, picking up her top. "Minions aren't a challenge for a _true_ hero, no matter how many there are."

The top disappeared, and in its place, Queen Bee now held a pair of small…guns?

Rena heard the buzzing of angry bees as the guns rapidly fired fléchettes into the Heartless, poofing them faster than Rena had thought possible, before Queen Bee turned the swarm on Pete directly.

The shield held, but it looked like Pete was finally having to work for it. Which meant, maybe, that he could be rattled. Popping back out from her alleyway, she set the Mirage to charge at him from the side while she went after the other side, seeing if she could find a weak spot in his barrier.

Pete vanished into a dark pillar, before Rena or her Mirage could arrive.

Queen Bee smiled in a way Rena recognized from all the times when someone inevitably gave in to whatever _ridiculous_ demand that Chloé Bourgeois had insisted upon. Which meant the answer would be delivered with more condescension than information, but she had to know.

"How did you do that?" she asked, bracing for the answer. "And thank you."

"You're welcome," Queen Bee said airily. "When you've been denied your true heritage as a superhero as long as I have, you don't need to take very long to discover the secrets of your powers."

"So, you've been obsessing over it and thinking up new ways to use your powers?" Rena needled.

"When you say it like that, it sounds crass," she replied.

"I'm not the one with customized replica costumes of Ladybug and Chat Noir and a regular playdate to pretend to be a hero," Rena pointed out.

Queen Bee glowered. "Don't you have a turtle to go find?"

"A kitsune, actually, and I'm going to enjoy cutting off every one of her tails once I do," Rena growled. "If you see her again, let me know so I can give her more than a bloody nose."

Queen Bee shrugged, and the two heroes went their own ways.


	5. Forgotten Challenge

"What. _Is._ **_THIS?!_** " Ladybug demanded, pointing at the full-nearly-to-bursting space as Naminé and Xion arrived to investigate the scream.

"Looks like it's the 'Heroic/Romantic Sacrifice' Gallery," Plagg deadpanned.

"More like the 'Hall of Self-Sacrificing Bad Ideas'," Ladybug snapped. "Has he always been like this?"

Plagg fixed Ladybug with as serious a face as he could muster.

"Yes," he said. "Chat's family life is shit and the only thing he really enjoys is being Chat Noir."

"Why this, then?" Ladybug gestured to the various Chat-fantasies.

Plagg sighed. "A long time ago, he decided that he didn't matter, and the best thing he could do for everyone, but especially for the Bug he loved, would be to protect you. Even if it meant he didn't make it out alive."

Ladybug's mouth snapped shut and she turned to face Naminé.

"Fix this," she ordered.

"No."

"This is your…thing, isn't it?" Ladybug pressed.

"No." Naminé shook her head. "I…when I first was born, people used me to take apart someone's memories. It took a year for me to undo the damage that I had done, and in the process, I nearly destroyed the only friends I had made. I _won't_ do it again. Not for anyone."

"He's hurting! Why won't you help him?" Ladybug shouted, curling her fists.

"It's part of who he is," Naminé said. "Breaking those links could break him completely. I don't…I don't want to see that ever again. If you want a happy Chat Noir, you're going to have to forge those links yourself." Naminé fled back where she came from.

Ladybug stepped forward to pursue the argument, but Xion's raised Keyblade stopped her.

"Don't," Xion said, shaking her head.

Plagg floated up to sit on the end of Xion's Keyblade and crossed his arms, indicating where his opinion was on this particular debate.

"Fine," Ladybug sighed. "I can't fight all of you."

As she walked away, Ladybug drafted new plans for her dream house. Floor one would be her and Adrien and their three hamsters, just as planned. Floor two would be Chat Noir, with as many cat toys (and possibly cats) as he wanted to play with. And occasional visits from Ladybug to keep his spirits up and to go run off some energy together. Maybe once they got rid of all the remaining purple butterflies, she thought, snapping her yo-yo out in frustration at a vaguely purple blob in the distance.

"Bye-bye, little butterfly," she muttered absentmindedly, as a small white butterfly floated up from the purifying chamber of her yo-yo.

"Good instincts," Plagg said, laughing beside her. "Even when you're really mad, you can spot the akuma before it arrives."

"What?" Had that been an actual akuma?

"I told you leaving that fire on display was going to attract attention." Plagg chuckled. "Feel any better?"

She nodded. "A little, actually."

"Good," Plagg said.

"It still doesn't makes any sense," she said. "Chat Noir always seems so happy. And he doesn't hesitate on all of those terrible puns."

"Appearances can be deceiving," Plagg replied.

"That much?"

"And more," the kwami said. "Everybody has secrets, and everybody has darkness."

"I found that out the hard way." Ladybug grimaced. It had not been pleasant, fighting for control of herself from the creature trying to take her heart. "It was a really bad day."

"Yeah," Plagg said. "Imagine what it's like when nearly every day is a bad day, but the only person that's available to beat up is yourself."

Ladybug shivered.

"They're still self-sacrificing bad ideas," she insisted.

"Of course they are," Plagg said. "That doesn't make them any less tempting, though."

"Tempting?" Ladybug asked. "Why would they be tempting?"

"What else would you take seriously?" Plagg said, floating up into her face. "You keep telling him to be serious. He is."

"That's not the way to win my heart," she said.

"That would be a bonus," Plagg said. "Memorable would be a big bonus, but that's not what we're going for here. If it fixes the problem, he's going to go for it."

"But then there won't be a Chat Noir!"

"Then there won't be—" Plagg coughed black bubbles instead of the name he was going to say. "—which, in his opinion, might not be such a bad thing. Chat Noir will still continue."

"Why are you telling me this?" Ladybug asked. "You make it sound like I'm the only thing keeping him alive."

Plagg floated along thoughtfully in silence. "Because," he ventured, "when you find out who it is, you're going to need to understand how to get him out."


	6. Graceful Assassin

"What kept you?" Rena demanded as Carapace landed, well after the fight with Pete had finished.

"Not as easy as you thought," Carapace replied, breathing heavily. "Still, got what you asked for."

"Someone else showed up to replace Volpina, and then Ch— _Queen Bee_ , of all people, came and bailed me out," Rena said pointedly.

Carapace shrugged and gestured to the armored Peacock wielder next to him.

"Paravani will help us, if we can help her find her son afterward," he said. "I'm pretty sure Ladybug and Chat Noir will help, too."

"That's good to know, but right now, I want to find Volpina and Pete and knock them both into next week. I don't know where either of them went, though,"

Before Carapace could reply, the sound of an angry swarm of insects filled the air. Rena took off in the direction of the sound, Carapace and Paravani following.

Queen Bee was swarming Pete again as they arrived, but instead of trying to take the brunt of the attack on his shield, he seemed to be popping in and out of the purple columns right before the swarm reached him. No matter where he went, though, Queen Bee immediately swiveled her weapons to put pressure on him.

"Dude," Carapace said, whistling. "When—"

His question was cut off by the appearance of a second purple column right behind Queen Bee. Before anyone could shout a warning, a hand shot out and dragged her into the purple column before it disappeared.

Moments after, Lila appeared next to Pete from her own column, a satisfied smile on her face.

Paravani jumped off the roof, brandishing her fans and throwing one at the two villains. Startled, Carapace and Rena followed, Carapace holding his shield out to protect Rena until she was well beyond him and closing.

"Gotta go!" Pete said, giving the closing heroes a mock-salute and disappearing into another people column.

Lila batted away the thrown fan indifferently with a hand sheathed in dark power.

"I'm back," she said sweetly.

"That's not good," Carapace said softly.

"She'll go down just as easily," Rena said, and joined Paravani's attacks from another side.

It took one kick from Lila that sent Rena flying past Carapace to recognize it would be much harder this time. Paravani was hammering away at Lila, striking and guarding and moving with speed that Rena could barely follow, but Lila didn't seem to even be looking at several of the hits she blocked, and at least once, Carapace wasn't sure a body could actually bend that way.

Rena rushed past him again, rejoining the fray over his rushed "Wait!" They weren't going to get anywhere trying to overwhelm Lila with force. They needed strategy to work against her. And since Ladybug wasn't here, someone had to think.

Rena and Paravani went sailing by him again, landing with a crash several feet away. This was like Heroes' Day again, just without the—

The inkling of an idea came to mind.

"Shellter!" he called, creating a big barrier of his own and then turning to face the other Miraculous wielders that he prevented

"Rena, remember what Mayura could do with her feathers?"

"She made monsters out of people's emotions. I don't trust Paravani here enough to do that to me."

"Not you. _Lila_ ," he said.

"Huh?" Rena said first, then grinned. "I like it."

"Smart," Paravani said, smiling. "But you still have to get it through to her."

"That's on you, dude," Carapace said, grinning. "We'll keep her distracted."

"If we let that darkness out, there's a good chance it will become more dangerous than if it stays inside," Paravani said. "Has that girl had ever held anything like our power? If she had, I’d expect her to be a Darkling by now."

Rena shook her head immediately. "Hawk Moth made her into an illusion of a Miraculous wielder, but she's never had one of her own."

Carapace nodded. "Ready?"

Rena nodded. “You have to hold out until Lila goes in for the kill. Then I’ll swap you for a much better-looking Mirage and Paravani will take advantage of the misdirection.”

The barrier contracted, leaving Carapace alone, holding his Shellter in one hand, before dropping it to his feet and kicking it at Lila. With an almost bored look, Lila flicked her hand at it to block. Right before it struck her hand, the Shellter popped out of existence, replaced by a flurry of feathers attacking Lila from all sides. A burst of darkness from Lila obliterated all the feathers swiftly.

Carapace had a second Shellter on the way almost immediately, which also burst into a cloud of feathers when it got close to Lila. The second swarm was met with a similar burst of darkness. On the third kicked Shellter, Carapace saw Rena’s Mirapace appear in front of him when the feather cloud sprang up and bolted for the closest piece of cover, diving behind it before the feathers disappeared. 

Now that he had cover, Carapace changed tactics. The Mirapace called for a Shellter, and Carapace made it large enough to surround Lila and close in on her, so she would have less available space to maneuver in and it would eventually try to crush her completely.

Lila appeared out of a purple column right in front of the Mirapace. The illusion convincingly fell back, as if startled, avoiding Lila's bolt of darkness that would have engulfed his head if he had still been standing. She looked down at the Mirage, darkness emanating in waves off of her, and pointed, focusing the darkness into a sharp point to stab his stunt double with.

Her attack struck true. Mirapace popped out of existence, the deception exposed by the contact.

Paravani stabbed Lila in the back with one of her fan's feathers before Lila could register her mistake.

The resulting explosion of darkness flung everyone away from Lila as she screamed in pain. Carapace, Rena, and Paravani slammed into the side of buildings as wave after wave of darkness battered their bodies relentlessly.

Carapace desperately tried to hold on to consciousness under the assault, but he could feel it slipping away from him, hit by hit.

"Shellter," he managed to get out before completely collapsing. The assault subsided immediately as the protective barrier surrounded him and the other two Miraculous wielders. All three weakly slumped to the pavement.

"I am never listening to you again," Rena Rouge wheezed, pointing a finger at him.

"Me, neither," he coughed. "This was a bad plan."

"The plan was fine," Paravani said, looking stronger than she sounded. "The execution left far too much to be desired."

"Can you control it?" Rena asked hopefully.

"F—Absolutely not," Paravani said, realizing who she was speaking to. "That monster is far too strong for me to control. We tapped that girl's core of darkness. We should all be dead and the world doomed."

"But we're not," Rena said, smiling as her breathing settled back toward normal. "And that means we've got a shot at winning."

"You make it sound like you fight these kinds of Heartless all the time," Paravani said pointedly.

"Our track record's pretty good so far." Rena grinned. "No reason to stop now."

Paravani chuckled.

"Very well, then. When you're ready, Carapace, you can drop the shield and we can fight for our lives."

Carapace shook his head. "Dude. That's one of the worst pep talks I've ever heard."

"If we're all going to die," Paravani pointed out, "then there's no use wasting words on platitudes."

"And when we win, we can be smug about it," Rena said, grinning.

"That's the spirit," Paravani said.


	7. The Eye of Darkness

It wasn't a dream. But it looked like one. She remembered stepping on these stained glass platforms. It seemed like ages ago that she had made what seemed like a simple choice to help fight the Heartless.

This time, though, it was Chat Noir on the glass, curled up and sleeping like a cat.

"You found his heart," Naminé said, her voice hanging in the air beside her, a tinge of pride, or perhaps amusement, coloring it.

"If this is his heart, what was all the rest of that?" Ladybug said aloud. She had gone witnessed plenty of scenes, fragments, and ideas, many of which had left her more confused about the state of Chat Noir than had given her help.

"Memories," Naminé said. "Be careful. It is here that the darkness is strongest."

"I'm ready," Ladybug said, unslinging her yo-yo. She started to cautiously climb the staircase to the next platform, looking out for Hawk Moth or any of his akumas.

The next platform was shrouded in shadows, but she didn't need light to see what was there. It was apparent what scene had been etched so firmly in Chat's heart. She had thought it was the last moment of Hawk Moth's life, when he had reaped the Cataclysm he had always deserved.

Now she had to do it again, without her partner.

A bolt of lightning flashed through the air. When her vision cleared, the scene had been illuminated.

Instead of the shadows of Chat Noir and Hawk Moth, Adrien Agreste grabbed his father by the chin, afraid of something, while Gabriel Agreste looked triumphant as his palm splayed across his son's chest.

"Oh," she said, stepping closer to the center of the platform. "It's you," she said a moment later, realizing the consequences of the scene she was witnessing.

The shadows gathered on the floor of the platform rushed their way up to Gabriel. She ran to Adrien and pushed—

_Protect her!_ rang through her head from the brief contact.

Adrien was on the floor. She'd broken the connection between Adrien and Gabriel, at least, and not a moment too soon. The shadows from the platform were encasing Gabriel in nightmare armor, the same way the other Ladybug had been armored.

Hawk Moth laughed as the armor finished forming. "How nice of you to offer yourself to me, Ladybug. Once I'm done with you, I'll make this puppet my vessel and I will get my wish."

"He's your son!" she shouted at Hawk Moth.

"He's a puppet," the armored nightmare snarled. "I haven't had a son in years."

"Father?" Adrien said groggily, pushing himself up to a sitting position.

"Hawk Moth has him," Ladybug said flatly.

Adrien laughed bitterly, a harsh sound at complete odds with the sunny model she had fallen in love with.

"Not has," he said. " _Is_."

"Be quiet, puppet," Hawk Moth ordered.

"How about no?" Adrien replied, standing up. "You got to terrorize me while we were alive. You don't get to haunt my afterlife."

"You could never kill me," Hawk Moth said. "You loved me too much to hurt me."

Ladybug forcibly shut her own jaw before telling either of them the truth of their situation.

Where was Plagg? He'd vanished as soon as she had entered Ch—Adrien's heart. Why would he leave now, when he was needed most?

_I need my partner,_ she thought. But without Plagg, she couldn't give Adrien what he needed to fight and win.

"Cat got your tongue, Ladybug?" Hawk Moth gloated, noticing her hesitation. "Since you're so frightened, why not hand over your Miraculous now?"

Miraculous! She remembered that she'd taken Hawk Moth's Miraculous after he'd been Cataclysmed. What was the kwami's name again?

"What's Hawk Moth's kwami's name?" she hissed quietly, hoping Naminé was still listening.

"Nooroo, Plagg says," Namin&ecaute whispered in her ear.

"Nooroo," Ladybug said, smiling. The purple butterfly kwami appeared in front of her.

"No!" Hawk Moth shouted. "Impossible!"

"I told you I'd killed you, _Father_ ," Adrien said, spitting the last word. "Like every other time, you didn't listen."

"What do I do, Nooroo?" Ladybug said.

"Say 'Wings rise'," he said, "and I will be at your service."

Ladybug grinned.

"Nooroo, wings rise!" she called.

She'd done some research and knew that ladybugs already had wings, as she felt the presence of another kwami's power settle in and merge with Tikki's. Now she could prove it as they burst out from her shoulders, iridescent and beautiful.

A small white butterfly appeared in her hand. On instinct, she covered it and infused it with red and black spots.

"Go find Adrien," she whispered to it. "I need my partner." The butterfly took off, its course set.

Hawk Moth lunged for the butterfly, hoping to capture it. Ladybug's wrapped her yo-yo around his hand and yanked it away, spinning Hawk Moth toward her.

Hawk Moth's hands temporarily dissolved into ink, freeing himself from the yo-yo. After they reformed, he pursued Ladybug's butterfly again, but the delay was enough. The red and purple butterfly landed gracefully on Adrien's head. A domino mask, identical to Ladybug's, appeared on his face.

"Hello, chaton," Ladybug said, grinning mischievously. "Will you help me finally squash this insect?"

"Gladly, my lady," he said, bowing as the transformation took place. Red and black butterflies covered his entire being before disappearing, leaving her partner.

Her own heart thudded at seeing him again.

His staff had changed, sporting a sharp-looking serrated blade on the end. From a distance, they looked suspiciously like key teeth, but she couldn't confirm it.

"I am the arrow loosed from my Lady's bow," he said, straightening from the bow. "My flight is swift, my aim is true, my results are deadly." He struck a fighting pose. "You may address me as Chat Noir."

"Bit dramatic," Ladybug deadpanned.

"Final boss confrontation," he said, grinning. "Not many opportunities for that left."

The armored Hawk Moth leveled his sword at them.

"One last time," Chat Noir said, turning serious again. "I will protect my Lady. For her sake, I will not fail."

Chat Noir and Hawk Moth charged each other, blades ringing as they clashed with a speed Ladybug could barely follow. Several times she thought Chat's spear had struck true, but Hawk Moth never flinched or made any indication he'd been hurt, and the battle continued.

Several times she slung her yo-yo, trying to trip Hawk Moth, distract him, or give Chat Noir an advantage, but Hawk Moth evaded all her attempts without looking at them.

She needed more firepower. Her Keyblade appeared in her hand, wrapped with string for easy throwing and catching. She sent it spinning for Hawk Moth's heart, who stepped back to block both her and Chat Noir's attacks, rather than ignoring her. She pulled on the string to drag the key back toward Hawk Moth for another pass, nearly striking him in the head before his sword batted it away again.

Now they were getting somewhere. Each time Hawk Moth had to deflect her Keyblade, it left him open for Chat to attack with his own weapon. She could see each time that Hawk Moth was only barely getting his weapon back in time to block them. If either of them could catch Hawk Moth in a feint…

Chat Noir reacted as if he had read her mind, baiting Hawk Moth into probing for a weakness and trapping his blade with his staff for just a moment. Ladybug's Keyblade was already on its way. Hawk Moth freed his sword in time to deflect her attack, but she could see how far out of his usual position he was.

Chat Noir stabbed him cleanly through the heart.

Hawk Moth laughed. It didn't seem to have done anything to him. Nothing leaked out or gave any indication that he'd been hurt at all by this.

"Cataclysm," Chat said, gritting his teeth, and punched the armored nightmare in the face.

Hawk Moth exploded into a cloud of purple butterflies.

"That's new," Chat said.


	8. Scythe of Petals

"That's different," Carapace said, unlimbering his shield as he leapt out of the way of the tail attempting to smash him into the pavement.

"That's Lila, all right," Rena muttered, sliding underneath the claws slashing over her head.

Paravani snapped her fans open and stabbed the first, second, and third appendage that got close to her without saying anything.

Hawk Moth transformed his victims into darker versions of themselves, flooding their hearts with darkness and shaping their bodies and powers with his imagination. Mayura took the darkness in her victim's hearts and created giant Heartless that normally existed outside of their bodies. It didn't make them any less deadly, Rena knew, but she was out of her experience with _this_.

With her darkness set free, Lila had _fused herself_ with her Heartless into a monster with two bodies, lots of pointy ends, and magic flying everywhere. Rena was having trouble fending off everything coming toward her, which left no time to strategize, communicate, or do anything but try to stay alive. There were at least a couple of times where Carapace's shield had to have protected her from something, or Paravani deflected something away.

They were way outclassed. Lila clad in the dark was bad, but this was a nightmare given form. Maybe if they had Ladybug or Chat Noir to help them out, they could do something.

Carapace called up a Shellter to surround them, right before an orb of magic she hadn't even seen coming detonated. Carapace went to a knee from the impact.

"We're getting our asses kicked out there," he breathed.

"Hang on," Rena said. "How many times have you pulled up this Shellter?"

Carapace shook his head. "No clue."

"Exactly," she said, smiling. "How would the strategy change if you knew you could just keep going infinitely, assuming you don't keel over from getting hit?"

Rena twirled her flute. "Let's see if we can't exhaust Lila a little bit chasing shadows."

"So, same idea as before, then?" Paravani said.

"Yep." Rena nodded. "With some extra help. Get in what hits you can, since you're the only one that isn't breathing hard. Carapace, you keep me protected, and I'll do the rest."

Carapace helped them get out of Lila’s sight before dispersing the barrier to let Paravani out.

"Mirage!" Rena called, invoking her power to make a Ladybug appear on a nearby roof. And then another, to make Chat Noir appear nearby. A third for Queen Bee, making it seem like she'd reappeared through one of the purple columns. A fourth for Carapace and Rena, well away from where they actually were.

Lila laughed, a deep and unsettling echo of what human laughter might be.

"Your illusions can't fool me, Rena Rouge! I can see right through them."

"Damn," Rena said. "They need to be more solid. What can we do to help with that?"

Carapace turned to her. "I could use the Shell to make them more solid."

"They'll disappear once Lila decides to hit them with, well, anything. We'd have to be perfectly in sync to push away any of her attacks. Which is much easier to do on Dancing Stage than in battle," Rena said, cutting off his next point before he could get to it.

"Oh, that's it!" he said. "We've been thinking about this wrong. Lila can attack us everywhere and anywhere, right?"

Rena nodded and made a 'get to the point' gesture.

"Okay, dude," he said, "Lila can't get through the barrier, so why not use it to stop her from going anywhere?"

"Lahiffe, either you're a genius, or I'm going to come back in my next life and kill you all over again."

Carapace poked his head around the corner to get the right angle and distance, and then slung his shield into the air, aiming Lila's head. One of the wings curled in front and knocked the shield into the air as Lila laughed.

"Wait for it…Shellter!" he cried.

The hexagonal barrier enclosed Lila. Scouting around, Rena looked for any sign of Paravani, but she was apparently close enough to get caught inside, too.

"Nino!" she hissed! "You've gotten Paravani in there, too."

"That's…the plan, dude," he said. "Just like you said, she's the only one who isn't breathing hard. And with Lila confined, Paravani can probably do real damage."

"Did you just put deliberately put someone in mortal danger?" she said angrily.

"No," he said confidently. "She'll survive. I'm sure."

"You'd better be sure," Rena said.

Carapace flinched.

"You don't feel it every time Lila misses and hammers the barrier," he said. "The best I can say is that she's not happy about this. It's up to Paravani."

"It always was, wasn't it?" Rena said.

"Mm-hmm."

"Next time I see Ladybug, I'm insisting on training for everyone on how to fully develop their Miraculous."

"If we survive."

"That's on you, Nino. You and Wayzz."

They settled in to wait. One way or another, this was going to get resolved today.


	9. Darkness of the Unknown

Ladybug's yo-yo snagged another butterfly floating close to them. Hawk Moth's voice laughed from the cloud of butterflies.

"I can't beat all of them at once!" Ladybug said, realizing she was starting to let her panic show in her voice.

"Most of them probably aren't important," Chat Noir said. "If there were some way of pointing out which ones were the key ones, like in the video games, we'd be able to focus our efforts."

"I can't find a pattern," Ladybug said. "They should be protecting the core ones, right? But none of them seem more important than others."

"And it would be just like Hawk Moth to put his core somewhere other than his heart," Chat Noir said. "Since he never had one to begin with."

Ladybug snapped another butterfly into her yo-yo.

"Why isn't he just attacking with all of them?" Ladybug said. "He could easily overwhelm us and akumatize us that way."

"Because…it's a distraction of some sort. If we're paying too much attention to the butterflies, something else happens?" Chat Noir brightened. "Of course! He wants us to panic, because that makes us vulnerable to his attack! If we make a desperate stand against the onslaught, we'll go down fighting, and he'll lose! He needs us to let him in by letting fear take over!

"But he should know that he can't make me afraid when you're here, my lady," he said. "Together, we're the unstoppable force and the immovable object."

That was classic Chat Noir. He had enough confidence for both of them when they needed it. Hawk Moth seemed to sense the change as well, as a maelstrom of butterflies began to surround them. Ladybug and Chat stood back to back, spinning their staff and yo-yo together, waiting for the butterflies to attempt to break through.

Rather than starting slowly and increasing their speed, the butterflies came at them in a whirl. There wasn't time to think, much less strategize about targets as each of them desperately spun, whirled, deflected, smashed, and tried to maintain their space in the face of the butterfly assault.

"Give up, Ladybug. Give in, Adrien." Hawk Moth's voice echoed around them as the butterfly swarm continued.

"Never!" Chat said, grabbing Ladybug by the hand and using his staff to propel them into the air, forcing the butterflies to chase as they sailed down toward a different platform on the stage.

"We can't keep running forever, chaton!" Ladybug said.

"We won't," he said. "You'll come up with something. I just need to keep you alive long enough to do it."

Ladybug grimaced at him. "Self-sacrificing ideas are still bad, Chat Noir," she said in her sternest voice.

"Chat protects Bug. Chat can die. Bug can't. That's the way of the universe," he replied.

She turned her attention to the chasing butterflies. There wasn't any one of them hanging back or hiding behind others that would look like a target. There had to be some way that she could figure out where to focus her efforts. If only she had a Lucky Charm!

"Ugh. If I just had my Lucky Charm, I could figure this out!" she said to Chat Noir.

Chat landed them on a platform and sprung back toward the initial place they'd left.

"I'm getting a little tired keeping us on the run, my lady. Those are some really beautiful wings you have. Could you fly with them?" he said.

"Now's not the time to try and figure that out, Chat Noir! Besides, these wings are only here because—Chat, you're a genius!"

Ladybug kissed Chat on the cheek, then said, "Time to make your dream come true, Chat Noir."

She pulled her own butterfly from Chat, dropping his transformation, before asking, "Nooroo, can you do it again?"

"I can try," the kwami said.

"I need another Ladybug," she said, smiling, letting another red-and-black spotted ladybug fly toward Adrien.

She turned back to the oncoming butterfly swarm. "This time, I'm going to protect you, Adrien!" she exclaimed, thrusting her hand out to change the yo-yo into her Keyblade.

"Come and get me!" she called to the butterfly storm, whirling her Keyblade above her head, before slinging it into the storm, whipping it back and forth through the swarm to buy her own butterfly enough time to settle on Adrien.

"Let's do this," he breathed softly as the tiny butterfly alit on his head. A familiar mask flashed briefly in front of his eyes, and the familiar red and black she knew he admired covered him completely and the transformation completed.

"Okay, my lady!" he said when the transformation had finished. "How?"

"Throw the yo-yo into the air and say—"

"LUCKY CHARM!" they both shouted.

The yo-yo disappeared. A set of opera glasses dropped into Ladrien's hand.

Ladybug felt a slight sigh of relief that Lucky Charm didn't only give her objects that didn't make immediate sense. The swarm blinked as the magic tried to tell her how to use the Lucky Charm. Ladrien blinked. The opera glasses blinked. She looked around to see if anything else was needed, but that seemed to be it. Glasses, swarm, Ladrien.

Not entirely sure what to do with what she had been shown, she re-focused her attention on the swarm. Not too soon after, the swarm started to turn in a new direction, giving Ladybug the cue she needed to look behind her and see what was going on. Ladrien sprinted toward Ladybug, Lucky Charm in hand. He looked really cute in her red and black as he zoomed past, handing her the opera glasses before turning around and sticking his tongue out at the butterfly swarm.

"Watch carefully, my lady," he said, and took off running again.

Ladybug spun out of the way of the swarm as it changed course to follow Ladrien, looking at it through the opera glasses. The faint glow continued to suffuse the swarm as it chased Ladrien around the platform. Nothing looked any different as Ladrien continued to flirt with the edge of the platform. One bad step, she realized, and he'd fall off. She wasn't sure if she could tell the difference between an accident and an 'accident' at this point, based on what she had seen and knew about Adrien’s cavalier attitude toward his own mortality.

She screamed when he slipped and somersaulted off the edge of the platform all the same.

Too stunned to do anything further, Ladybug watched in horror as the swarm followed, eager to get him before he disappeared.

She'd just let Adrien fall to his death. She sank to her knees, realizing there wasn't any way to save him now. Hawk Moth had won. He'd destroyed his own son.

Hawk Moth's laugh echoed from above them. Ladybug looked up, but couldn't see anything. Grabbing the opera glasses, she looked again at where she had heard Hawk Moth laugh. One purple butterfly flapped down from the darkness above.

"You failed him, Ladybug, in his hour of greatest—"

Whatever soliloquy, victory speech, or gloating Hawk Moth had in mind would never be heard: Ladybug's yo-yo snapped shut around the last piece of him still in Adrien's heart.

"Gotcha," she said, angrily. "No more evildoing for you, Hawk Moth. Ever."

The yo-yo slipped from her hands as the tears finally came.

"Chat Noir…Adrien, you _inconsiderate asshole!_ ” she screamed.

"That's pretty harsh, my lady," Ladrien said behind her.

Ladybug would later claim that Adrien had startled her and she had reacted before she realized who had spoken. She’d also say that Adrien deserved what happened when she whirled around and Nora Césaire's signature uppercut connected with his chin, launching him through the air.

"Ow," he said after he had landed. "Good thing these suits are invulnerable. I also suddenly have a smidgen of sympathy for the time that Lila took one of these in the same place."

"Inconsiderate. **_Asshole!_** " Ladybug snarled at him. "Do you have _any_ idea how much it _hurts_ every time I watch you get akumatized or controlled or _die_ , Adrien?"

"LB?" Adrien said. He finally sounded like he was starting to understand her, and he looked ready to wilt as she willed herself to glare harder at him.

"Oh, no, we're _well_ past the point of keeping our identities secret, Adrien Agreste. I have had the biggest crush on you developing every single day you are in class. I could work with Chat Noir and redirect his flirting, because I had you to strive for. Now I have to reconcile with myself that you are also Chat Noir, and to be honest, that _lowers_ my opinion of you a lot."

"I didn't mean to scare you, Marinette," he said. "We said earlier that we might have to draw out the real butterfly, and I thought showing a moment of vulnerability might actually do it. I grabbed the side of the platform on the way down, and scrambled back up as soon as you captured him."

Ladybug intensified her glare, and Adrien abruptly found himself without his own Ladybug suit.

"If you keep taking foolish risks with your life, Adrien, one of these times I'm not going to be able to bring you back with the Miraculous Cure. If you die, that's the end of me, too," she told him, her lip quivering. "You don't know how much you _mean_ to me. I don't know if you ever will. But you can't keep throwing yourself at things like this. I need a partner who has something to live for, and you keep trying not to, dammit!"

She hoped Adrien could see how much effort she was putting into not having a stress explosion all over him. He nodded slowly.

"Hawk Moth and Mayura are dead. We can defeat anything else that comes our way. With our friends."

" ** _Promise me, Adrien._** Promise me you'll try to stay alive. To live. With your heart. Wake up, Adrien. Please."

Adrien thought. He could never say no to Ladybug, but she was asking to alter the deal. Chat dies, Bug lives. That was how it always was.

"Time's running out, chaton," Ladybug said. "We have to wake up soon. Come back with me. Everyone is waiting for us. Your mom will be so glad to see you again."

"Mother?" he said.

"She woke up just after you fell asleep. She's out there. So are your friends."

In the darkness above them, a keyhole appeared.

"Promise me that you'll come back, and I'll go," Ladybug said.

Adrien nodded.

"Say the words, Adrien."

"I promise."

" _Mean them_."

"I promise, my Lady. We'll wake up together."

She studied his face, looking for any sign he might not be committed, or any crossed fingers or other signifiers.

"You know how much I hate liars," she said.

"I promise. With my whole heart," he said.

Ladybug threw her yo-yo into the Keyhole and swung into it.

* * *

Chat Noir sat up with a yowl.

For the first instant, he was confused as to where he was. Then he felt someone hug him tightly.

Now that he knew why, Marinette's incredible ability to compress his ribs with her hugs was less startling and more comforting.

"Adrien?" said a voice he hadn't heard in what had seemed like a decade, and then someone else was hugging him equally as tightly. Émilie Agreste's face smiled at him, the most prominent in a sea of people all looking very concerned for him. "It's been so long."

"Hi, Mama," Adrien said.


	10. Yozora

"Child," Maleficent said, looking at Lila's bruised and battered body. "Darkness is not a toy to be played with. Nor is it a crude instrument used solely to overwhelm. It must be nurtured and fed, but more importantly, it must be tamed and mastered."

A purple column sprang up behind Maleficent.

"I can sense your determination from here, child. When you have gathered enough skill to be worth my time, I will return, and your lessons can resume." Maleficent disappeared into the purple column, which dissipated soon afterward.

For the first time in a very long while, Lila cried genuine tears.

* * *

Queen Bee huffed. Everything was always so monochromatic here. It was depressing. The Realm of Darkness didn't necessarily have to mean the Realm of Only Black Forever.

"Well, there's a sight for sore eyes," said a man with a patch over his right eye, dressed in one of the black coats for traveling in the Corridors of Darkness.

"Ugh, _you_ ," Queen Bee said, turning her head away.

"Oh, now, that's no way to say hello to one of your fellow apprentices, now is it? I thought I would check in with you, ever since you started traveling other worldlines looking for more Keyblade wielders."

"I still have no reason to trust you, Luxu," Queen Bee said. "You have the look of someone who gave their heart to darkness long ago."

"You haven't exactly kept your original appearance either, Ava," he countered.

"Unlike you," she said, a small smile playing at her lips, "I do not need to remove a heart to change my form."

"I could take you back," Luxu said nonchalantly. "It would beat hanging out here for a small eternity while things change all around you."

"No."

"Suit yourself," he said, and disappeared.

Ava relaxed a little, now that Luxu was gone elsewhere. The girl whose form she had borrowed would be waking soon, and now that her world had an anchor to the darkness, another Keyblade War was brewing. She would need Dandelions again.

"Master," she said, sighing. "Please come back. I have so many questions."

All that was left to do was wait. She would be needed again, and likely soon.

* * *

"To understand the power of the Keyblade, you must first understand your own heart," Chloé said.

It had to be a dream. Chloé wouldn't ever have spoken to her so gently.

Sabrina opened her eyes and gasped. A beautiful picture of herself, in stained glass, adorned the floor. She looked significantly more elegant than she had ever felt.

"Power sleeps within you, too," Chloé's voice said warmly.

**Author's Note:**

> Why Paravani for Émilie’s superhero name? Paravani is a peacock who is, conveniently, one of the vehicles of Kartikeya. It means I can stay in the same general mythological space as Mayura, since we don't have a canonical name of Emilie-as-Peacock to work with as of the time of writing.


End file.
